When managers and leaders are considering their organization’s strategy, its core competencies, and even its identity, they often forget that organizations are composed of people.

The people who compose this organizational entity are individuals. Each individual is unique, each individual is meaningful, each individual is capable of being authentic, each individual is capable of being thwarted in her efforts to make a difference by being part of the organization.

As she eloquently points out, all the hiring practices, roles, rules, responsibilities, and policies won’t turn people into automated mannequins. They still bring their unique capabilities and perspectives into work every day. They still decide on their own what to make of what is proposed to them. They choose how they will react to whatever circumstances present themselves at work. (And that will be true even if the U.S. Supreme court decides to bestow the rights of “personhood” on corporations.)

If the flesh-and-blood people leading organizations are smart, they will open themselves to all the possibilities, wisdom and creativity that reside in the people who make up “the organization” and maximize the contributions from their hands, minds and hearts to create a better enterprise.